I have a deep abiding love for Ursula's Le Guin's The Wizrd of Earthsea. Great book, which is a comfort read for me - I probably read it about once a year.

Yes, and it's beautifully written

Have you read the later books? (starting with Tehanu) — in which she reconfigures the magical element from a sort of feminist viewpoint, essentially portraying "men's magic" as a mistake. It's well done, but you have to read them twice to appreciate it. The first time through you don't get where the story is going (because it's not going where you expect/want it to go).

Originally Posted by luka

the phantom tollbooth-norman juster

One of my all-time favourite books

Originally Posted by routes

And the dark is rising trilogy by susan hill..

by Susan Cooper — and there are five books

I guess The Dark is Rising itself is the best, though The Grey King is also very good, and I have a certain fondness for Greenwitch.

Others...

Richard Adams - Watership Down
Rosemary Sutcliff's Roman Britain books: The Eagle of the Ninth, The Lantern Bearers, etc
some of Robert Westall's supernatural books: The Wind Eye, The Devil on the Road
John Christopher's Prince in Waiting trilogy

Patrick Ness's Chaos Walking trilogy is also very good — but those are recent, so I can't say they "still haunt my imagination" or anything.

my favourite kids book involved a kid who looks through a magic telescope and ends up in a strange, frankly psychedelic world full of weird logic, some kind of Captain America type superhero and much oddness. Wish to fuck I could remember the name..